Monuments, he thought derisively.
Monuments were the galaxy's way of honoring the "heroic", the
powerful…and the dead. Monuments of stone, marble, duracrete, and
obsidian. Monuments glorifying the ancient, the scholars, and the
angels. He had seen more monuments made to honor the ideals of fools
and politicians than he cared to think about. Many of them lined the
halls of Imperial Center, attesting to the greed and bureaucracy of
the Senate and the wars fought in the name of that ever elusive
peace. Due to duplicity, sedition and treason, the galaxy had not
changed from the sick, wasted galaxy of the Clone Wars, but that was
not what he cared to think about here, at this place. This
place deserved quiet and calm and he would call it to him even if it
meant giving up the darkness, his constant companion and only refuge,
if only for this moment. She deserved this.

The sun had
always shone brilliantly on Naboo, its warmth and light one of the
galaxy's true comforts in the old world, his old world. His home
planet's suns were brighter and more intense, but nowhere near the
beauty of the light here. It had been many years since he had thought
of beauty, his life had been forfeit for another cause long ago and
that elusive call of peace was always one step in front of him,
reminding him of his duty and the price paid to achieve it. Still,
when his guard was down and he was weak, this planet and its
treasures would find their way back to his memory.

He had
purposely stayed away as long as possible. Now, twenty-one years
later, the Emperor saw no need to keep him away. After all, had two
decades of darkness not eradicated anything that might have been left
of the weak flickering flame of some weak man from long ago? Had it
not oppressed it with the damp, cold shadows until it did little more
than sputter? What did Palpatine have to worry about when calling him
to his sanctuary on his home planet? There was a war going on, and a
Rebellion still thriving. The Death Star had just been destroyed.
Palpatine cared nothing for sentiment, and he was sure that his most
trusted apprentice did not either.

The Emperor had nothing to
fear, what had happened so long ago lay buried beneath the blossoms
of this planet's most treasured flowers. Or so the Emperor thought.
There was a reason he had not accepted invitations over the years to
the Emperor's private compound, even when duty called for his
presence. He had always found some way to be needed elsewhere, some
dingy outpost or forsaken planet in his hunt for the Rebellion, even
if it were a lie. And somehow, the Emperor had always known better
than to test him on this, in his wisdom he knew that there were some
things better left buried and dead.

But here he was today,
after finally being summoned when there was no escape. He had been
summoned to come and brief an Inquisitor, one of Palpatine's
personal minions, on the Death Star disaster. Palpatine was in no
mood for the usual excuses and regrets. After leaving Palpatine's
retreat, he had found himself here, despite years of denial
and rejection.

He looked up to the monument, its curves and
corners dappled in the sunlight. He had no sense of smell, but he
knew the smell that surrounded the monument in the blossoms
and wildflowers. It had haunted him for over twenty years. In a
happier time, he could recall that smell at will. It kept him sane in
battles and made the longing for home a little less hard to bear. He
would have been wary of passersby, but this place was out of the way,
in a small garden in the court of Theed. A small voice inside of him
stirred.

She shouldn't be here. Her home was at the
lake. That is where she would have wanted to be.

But
where was the voice when the time came to let those who buried her
know what her last wishes would have been? Where was he when she had
given birth to their child? Where was he when that child died? Where
was he when she had needed him? He was her husband. Had she loved him
even at the end? Had she ever given up on him? He should spend his
life not knowing, but he did. He knew. And because of this he
hated the man the voice belonged to with a hunger so ferocious that
it fed the dark in him more than anything Palpatine or the Rebellion
could ever do. He stepped away from the monument, looking through the
mirrored lenses at the angelic face carved in stone. Even in granite,
she was an angel. He looked down to the words etched at the base:

Padmé Nabérrie Amidala, Former Queen and
Senator

In duty, there always comes honor. In
darkness, there always comes light. In sadness, there always comes
hope.

Darth Vader stood for a moment, nothing but the
sound of the mechanical breather grating against the silence of the
garden. He had no flower to place on the gravesite, he had not
planned to ever be here.

She should not be here.

He
snuffed the voice and the feelings of despair that threatened their
way inside the dark shell. It would not do now to go back. He must
make his despair useful. He must always be vigilant in his
all-encompassing hatred of the man that was Anakin Skywalker. She
deserved this.

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